


toast and tea, sunshine and shadow

by ephemeralblossom



Category: Rumpelstilzchen | Rumpelstiltskin (Fairy Tale), Sleeping Beauty (1959)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Good and Evil, Multiple Crossovers, Pre-Canon, Stealth Crossover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-02
Updated: 2014-11-02
Packaged: 2018-02-23 14:37:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2551190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ephemeralblossom/pseuds/ephemeralblossom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why did Maleficent curse Aurora?</p>
            </blockquote>





	toast and tea, sunshine and shadow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Untherius](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Untherius/gifts).



> For Untherius (happy Yuletide!), whose assignment was a joy to find in my inbox:
> 
> _Maleficent's motivation has always bugged me. In the original tale, her actions are a disproportional response at best. In Disney, it's somewhat of a mystery. Surely she doesn't just show up and curse a baby for no apparent reason, right? So why'd she do it? There are various ideas out there, so give me one of yours._
> 
> Thank you so much to my truly fantastic beta, Morbane! ♥ For specific notes on the crossovers and canon divergence, see the end notes. Warning, massive spoilers (the canon divergence is at the end).

When Maleficent arrived at Zauberei University, the first thing she noticed was how light it was.

Her home was beautiful, a towering mountain castle enspelled by her mother as a dissertation project. The spells had taken two years, Maleficent's mother said, and by the end she had begun to be quite bored with crenellations and battlements. Luckily a passing dragon had turned out to be an enchanted prince, and when she caught him, had helped to while away the down hours. (Enchantments took time to properly mature, and there was only so much wizard's solitaire one could play.) The finished project, however, was stunning; grand long lines rearing towards the sky, defying gravity and striking awe (or fear) into any rash travelers passing by.

It was, however, incredibly dark.

Part of the darkness was her mother’s fault – having earned her degree in magical architecture, caught a prince, and given birth to an heir, she’d promptly had a midlife crisis and switched into magical husbandry, growing a fearsome enchanted forest around the castle that had the effect of shutting out light to the lower floors. Part of it was the area – there were thunderstorms a great deal of the time, and Maleficent couldn’t remember the last truly sunny day. And part of it was Maleficent herself, who loved nothing better than to toil away in her windowless dungeon workshop, preparing for the entrance exams to Zauberei and putting up with the pet raven who her father had regrettably taught to talk.

Now, blinking in the sunshine, she peered around for the building the registrar had pointed out to her as her new dormitory. The day hadn’t started well. They’d had a small mixup, the registrar had said apologetically, and she’d been put in the good dormitory by mistake. If she wouldn’t mind _terribly_ , could she stay there for the time being? Someone would surely blow themselves up by the third week, or drop out in tears, or be enchanted into a teapot, and then she could transfer over to evil where she belonged.

Maleficent had tried to explain that her mother would be appalled if she heard that her only daughter had been placed in the _good_ dormitory, and that when her mother was appalled people tended to turn into thornbushes, but the registrar had been firm. (Maleficent had considered cursing the registrar until she was placed in the proper dormitory - it seemed a fitting way to demonstrate her evil qualifications, for one thing - but she had a sneaking suspicion the mild-mannered helpfulness concealed a greater magical competence. Losing to a bureaucrat in a wizard's duel on her first day would be a sorry way to start her university career.) So unless she physically marched over to the evil dormitory and bought or enchanted her way in, she was going to have to put up with a bunch of annoying do-gooders to start off her university career.

There was one now, all demure braids and big white smile. “Excuse me,” she said, laying a peremptory hand on the girl’s shoulder, “I’m looking for the good dormitory.”

The girl wasn’t quite able to hide her surprise. She had big brown eyes. “Oh! Are you sure?” Then she blushed. “I mean, I’m sorry, I don’t mean to stereotype, of course, it’s right this way…”

Maleficent looked down at herself. She thought her black robes were quite fashionable, in the severe I-am-here-for-school-not-partying style. Perhaps it was the hairdo; much to her chagrin, Maleficent had inherited the most _atrociously_ red hair from one of her grandmothers. An evil sorceress should _not_ have bright red hair that tended to go frizzy when it rained. Her mother had attempted to enchant it to a more suitable color, but hair (being attached to the body, and constantly renewing itself) was difficult. It was easier to turn somebody into a teapot – _all_ of them – than to enchant part of their body and leave the rest wondering what the flibbergibbet was going on. 

The solution they’d come up with was a hairstyle that her great-grandmother had worn, a black, horned headdress that covered the offending carroty mop and looked properly awe-inspiring as well. Maleficent quite liked it, although it got a bit hot sometimes. This sun wasn’t helping.

“I’m evil,” she said, cutting into the girl’s chatter, “but the registrar was distracted. Something about a senior fireworks rehearsal. She accidentally put me in good, and I can’t switch until someone turns into a tadpole.”

The girl looked surprised for a moment, but then laughed. “Oh, that was Merryweather and Flora. They really shouldn’t have gone on the fireworks committee together – you’ll meet them, they’re lovely, but they argue a lot.” She couldn't seem to take her eyes off the raven on Maleficent’s shoulder. Maleficent suspected that they saw a lot stranger things than a pet raven at Zauberei. (At least, she hoped they did.) “Come on, it’s this way. Let me carry your satchel, you look tired.”

Good people. Always trying to impress with their sweetness. Might as well take advantage, though. Maleficent surrendered the satchel and followed.

***

By week two, Maleficent had adjusted to the sunshine, but everything else was still a bit off. No space had yet opened up in the evil dormitory, although two first-years in good had turned themselves into croissants attempting a transfiguration spell beyond their capabilities. Maleficent had contemplated eating one, partly to keep up her street cred as evil – she was getting sideways glances from her evil peers – and partly because it looked tasty. She kept missing dining hall, because it was so easy to lose track of time when you were in the lab. (Fauna had shrieked and gathered the croissants in her shawl when she’d noticed Maleficent’s glance. Overreaction. If you were stupid enough to turn yourself into a croissant in the first week, you weren’t going to last at Zauberei, and people might as well eat you.)

“I made you a sandwich,” Talia said, popping up next to her. “You really need to go to lunch more often. You’re getting too skinny.”

Maleficent shrugged, but she took the sandwich. Talia was a miller’s daughter, and she made very good bread. “I was in the lab.” Two of her other suitemates, Merryweather and Flora, had been bickering again, but they’d made up yesterday, and Merryweather had made it clear that Maleficent should stay out of their room today. When Merryweather and Flora made up, everyone knew to give them alone time afterwards.

Talia frowned. “Staying away from Merryweather? You shouldn’t let her push you around like that. It’s your room too. They can go to Flora’s room if they want.”

“Fauna’s working on a project in there,” Maleficent said. If the situation ever got _too_ bad, she could always curse Merryweather and Flora into checkers for a couple days. The problem with cursing your roommates, however, even if it did lead to fewer metaphorical socks on the doors, was that then you had to constantly watch your back. A pair of roommates on the third floor had been gradually escalating for days. And Merryweather looked like the type to hold a grudge forever. “It’s fine. I prefer the lab anyway.”

Luckily, her professor for “Introduction to Evil: Curses, Grimoires, and You” still remembered Maleficent's mother. Something about a curse she’d worked as a first-year that silenced all the alarm clocks on exam day so that most of her year didn’t turn up to take the final, allowing her to easily claim top marks? (It sounded like her mother, Maleficent was proud to say.) Her professor had been so impressed, in fact, that she’d been willing to set up an independent study for Maleficent on top of her normal work, which was a real sign of respect for a first-year. Even if it did mean Maleficent practically slept in the lab. (She didn’t _actually_ sleep in the lab. She knew better. Magical potion ingredients took on a life of their own during the witching hour, and she’d prefer to wake up with eyebrows.)

Talia was still frowning. Then her brow cleared. “I know! If I switch with Merryweather, she can have my single. If Merryweather was in a single room, she and Flora could have all the fights and makeups they wanted, without bothering the rest of us.” She smiled. “And if I'm sharing with you, I can make sure you eat.”

Maleficent thought about suggesting that _she_ and Talia switch – a single room sounded pretty heavenly – but her mother had always been hopeless with money (the castle was far too large for the three of them, and took a fortune on upkeep), and the extra fee for a single room was probably too much. She could try stealing the money or enchanting someone to give it to her, but while Zauberei taught the theoretical applications of evil magic, it frowned on you actually putting them into practice, at least outside the university campus. (A university developed town and gown problems, if its evil students went around enchanting burghers for their wallets in order to get money for alcohol or potions ingredients.) She really needed to hurry up with her independent study – being able to turn straw into gold would be a _massive_ help. (Her project might not look so immediately evil on the surface, but oh, Maleficent could think of so many evil things she could do with a stockpile of gold. And she could always set her father to guard it - he still got a bit dragon-y around the eyes when he saw gold.)

Talia, unknowing, echoed her line of thought. “I’d actually like to be in a double with you,” she confided. “It's cheaper than my single. Papa’s mill isn’t doing well, with the economy the way it is back home, and it’d be a big help if I could trim costs a bit.” She patted Maleficent on the thigh. “And I’d be rooming with you! We’d have great fun. Say you’ll do it.”

Maleficent opened her mouth to say that a place would surely be opening up in the evil dormitory soon – if she had to do some croissant-enchanting herself – but Talia’s eyes were so big and brown that she inexplicably found herself saying, “You get to talk to Merryweather about it. She gives me a headache.”

Talia smiled, and threw her arms around Maleficent in a quick hug. “Thanks! I’ll go talk to her right now.”

Maleficent looked after her in bemusement, still finishing her sandwich. Hugging. Really? Good sorceresses were so strange.

***

Rooming with Talia instead of Merryweather was much, much nicer. There was always tea waiting when Maleficent stumbled home bleary-eyed from the lab (Talia must have some sort of spell set to tell her when Maleficent was coming), and the room always smelled of fresh-baked bread.

Today, as Maleficent headed up the tower stairs, she could hear Talia’s voice from the doorway of their room. “I’m working on a project to transform wheat stalks into bread. It’s early days yet, but I hope…” She broke off when she saw Maleficent’s head appear at the top of the stairs. “You’re back! Come have some tea.”

The boy talking to Talia turned around. He was tall, and attempting to grow a scraggly beard. Still too young to pull it off properly, though. His eyes went wide at the sight of her robes and headdress.

Maleficent suppressed the urge to roll her eyes. (Evil, yes. Petulant, no.) The only problem with rooming with Talia – besides not being around her own peers - was the never-ending swains. You’d think somebody would’ve enchanted the perimeter of the university to keep nonmagic folk out, but some people liked the town boys, and everyone who didn’t was apparently too busy on their own work. And Talia, being by far the prettiest girl at Zauberei, was seldom without some moony-faced youngster throwing pebbles at her window.

(Though they didn’t actually throw pebbles at the window anymore. The last time someone had tried that, Maleficent had charmed the pebbles to rocket back down at stinging velocity. There had been some yelps, and Talia, though on the side of good, had had to bite back a satisfied little smile – they’d had an exam in the morning, and pebbles at 2am were _not helping_.)

She jerked her chin in acknowledgment of Talia’s latest conquest and swept past him into the room. Tea. And warm bread, spread with fresh butter. Heaven.

From beyond the haze of hot tea, she dimly heard Talia saying goodbye to the swain, and then her roommate came in and flopped into the chair. “You weren’t very nice to Stefan.”

“Evil,” Maleficent pointed out, because hello. She might have withdrawn her request to be moved to the evil dormitory after the first month, because it would’ve been a lot of trouble to move everything over, and actually she got a lot of work done without all of her dormitory mates setting boobytraps in her room while she was at the lab – Sara had come in missing her nose last week, and it’d been three days before she’d tracked down the spell in the library that enabled her to grow a new one – but that didn’t mean she was _good_ now. She didn’t have to put up with obligatory social niceties. The headdress said so.

“He’s a nice boy,” Talia said, reprovingly. Then she sighed. “And he’s the prince of my kingdom, so I have to be nice to him. My father’s mill is nearly going under, and royal disfavor could sink it entirely.”

“If he’d take out his spleen about you rejecting him on your father’s mill, then he’d belong on my side,” Maleficent said. That should make him more attractive to her, she supposed, but just because you were evil didn’t mean you necessarily liked other evil people. In fact, it generally worked in the other direction, she’d found.

Talia snorted. On anyone else it would have been unattractive, but Maleficent found it oddly endearing on her. Good people and their stupid endearingness. “Don’t let him hear you say that! He’d probably take mortal offense. His mother isn’t magical, and he doesn’t really like magic, I don’t think.”

“Then he shouldn’t be interested in you,” Maleficent pointed out, logically. Perhaps if men could use magic, they wouldn’t be quite so skittish about it. Her father still jumped every time her mother uncorked a spell.

“Well, I’m not a _real_ sorceress,” Talia said, a touch of wistfulness in her voice. “Not like you. I’m just working on bread, that’s all.”

“I think bread’s very important,” Maleficent said, reaching for another piece. “If you can create a loaf of bread from a stalk of wheat, you’ll never starve.” She chewed, thinking. “Although you might be able to destroy a baker's livelihood.”

Talia laughed, then stood up briskly, as if chasing away the memory of Stefan. “If I have a horde of angry bakers coming after me, I’ll just have to send for you to turn them into croissants.”

Maleficent widened her eyes. “Is this a good fairy I hear talking?”

“You’re rubbing off on me,” Talia said, but her voice was fond, and she handed Maleficent the butter saucer.

***

When Maleficent opened the door, there were roses everywhere.

Literally, _everywhere_. It wasn’t quite as bad as the time Maleficent had misread a spell when she was five and there had briefly been one million frogs filling every room of the castle, but it was close. Roses on the beds, roses on the desks, roses on the table, roses on the floor…

“Talia?” she asked, tentatively, half expecting to discover her roommate had been transfigured into a giant rose. Perhaps some of her evil compatriots had booby-trapped the good dorm in an attempt to sabotage their rivals' revision for the looming exams? Or perhaps the croissant first-years had struck again.

But no, there was Talia, coming out of the bathroom, looking stressed. “Would you mind doing a banishing spell? My wand’s somewhere under all of this.”

Maleficent obliged. Somewhere, somebody was going to have a rose-storm dumped on their heads. You could aim these things, if you wanted, but right now Maleficent didn’t have the patience for finesse. “What happened?”

“Stefan,” Talia said, as if that explained it, and then sat down and burst into tears.

Maleficent wasn’t good with tears. Her mother didn’t believe in them, and when her father got into a gloomy mood, he tended to paint, not cry. Tears had always made Maleficent skittish; the first time she’d taken candy away from a baby – one of her first lessons in evil – the ensuing screams had made her hastily thrust the candy back into its hands and vow to only be evil to adults from then on. Squalling infants were not dignified.

Her first instinct was to flee, but this was _Talia_ , and there was a large debt of bread-and-butter and tea to pay back. She sat gingerly down on the bed next to her and, for lack of any smart ideas, patted her back. “Did he hurt you?” She might only be a first-year, but an unmagical scoundrel would be no match for her. There were quite a few evil things she could think of. Banishment spells, for instance, worked on more than just roses.

But Talia was shaking her head. “No. It’s just… he’s been coming on really strongly, and I don’t… I didn’t ask for all this!” She waved her hand, presumably to indicate the now-banished roses. “I just want to finish the year, and go home for the summer, and see my father. I don’t need Stefan making a nuisance of himself when I’m busy enough for three people.”

Maleficent understood stress. If she didn’t come home with good enough grades, she was likely to spend her summer weeding the enchanted forest by hand, without her wand. Her mother believed in the motivating power of good hard work. Oh, her mother would be right there weeding alongside her – she was evil, but not _evil_ \- but that didn’t mean Maleficent was thrilled at the prospect.

“Maybe tell him to come back next year,” she suggested. “If you like him. If not, tell him where he can stick his…”

“Maleficent!” Talia said, but she was laughing between her tears, and she reached out to squeeze Maleficent’s hand. “I will. The roses are the last straw. It’ll be fine, you’ll see. He's actually rather nice. I'll introduce you properly next year.”

She was still wiping away tears, though, so Maleficent cast about for a new subject. “Tell me about your summer plans.”

There was so much work waiting for her in the lab – she was nearly there, she could almost taste the gold waiting to be woken from her piles of straw, and gold wasn't pleasant-tasting – but for now, she sat on the bed with Talia and listened to stories about a pretty land of rivers and plains, poor and hungry now but with a storied past and a hopeful future. It sounded nice, if more than a bit cliche. (Maleficent wasn't fond of "nice". Nice was boring, bland, inoffensive - all useless things.) Listening to Talia, Maleficent found herself missing her stone castle, and her interestingly evil parents.

***

“I can’t believe we got through our first year,” Talia said, sounding awed.

Maleficent poured her more champagne. They’d earned it, these past three weeks. Besides the stress of studying for exams, the end of term at Zauberei was dangerous due to all the magic fizzing around from sleep-deprived students who’d lost their focus edge. Just the other day, Maleficent had had to duck a zinger that would have otherwise torn through one of her horns. And there had been a stink-bomb in the bathroom last week (although for that, she blamed Merryweather, not the general miasma).

“Next year we’ll be _second-years_ ,” Talia said, still sounding awed. Maleficent, sipping her champagne, was in a generous mood and didn’t point out that yes, that was how math worked.

She’d finished second in her class, below only a ferocious sea-witch who was twice Maleficent’s size and fantastic at potion-brewing. Maleficent would have preferred to have been first, but the other evil students _had_ had an advantage from the enforced extra learning their living arrangements had given them. So she was reasonably pleased. There was always next year to take the sea-witch and all her tentacles on, after all.

“When do you leave?” she asked Talia, stroking her raven’s head absentmindedly.

Talia’s smile was like the sun breaking over the horizon, lighting up her face. It reminded Maleficent of far too many mornings stumbling back to the dorm at 5am after spending the night in the lab. But she’d successfully completed her independent study and spun a handful of straw into gold, much to her professor’s satisfaction. It belonged to the school, because she’d spun it with their materials, but perhaps this summer she could coax her mother into buying the materials to let her try it without her professor hanging over her shoulder. If she succeeded, she could spin enough gold to move out of the dormitories and get her own apartment next year. She liked the idea of having space that didn't include Flora and Merryweather, croissant first-years, or any of the small indignities that came with communal living. (Communal living in the wrong dormitory, no less. Her evil compatriots might have had more danger confronting them while they brushed their teeth, but at least it kept the spice in things. Too much niceness here. Maleficent would take an honest soap-on-the-toothbrush curse over passive-aggressive notes about hair in the shower any day.)

“Tomorrow morning,” Talia said, still smiling. “I’ll make you some bread before I go. You have a long trip – you have to promise me that you’ll eat!”

Maleficent cleared her throat uncomfortably. She was pretty sure she wasn’t supposed to feel this affectionate towards a good person. Evil was necessary in the world to balance out good, and if the two ever got too close, bad things could happen. (As opposed to _evil_ things, which happened for a reason.) If evil people started doing good things – if, for example, they became close friends with a good person, and wanted them to be happy – the whole balance of the system could collapse. “I’ll eat.”

“Good,” Talia said.

“You should room with me next year,” Maleficent said abruptly. “I’m going to try to get an apartment of my own.”

Talia looked surprised for a second, but then her face relaxed. “Rescuing me from the thin walls of the dormitory? You’re too kind.”

“I am not,” Maleficent said, feeling insulted, but then saw the teasing light in Talia’s eyes. “Just looking out for my bottom line. It’ll be cheaper with two people.”

“Two people and a raven,” Talia said, extending her gloved hand for the bird to fly to it. She was the only person the raven would tolerate, apart from Maleficent. She probably fed it bread and fruit while Maleficent was at the lab. Smart.

Maleficent watched them together for a moment, sipping her champagne and feeling the lightheadedness of post-exam relief. She was looking forward to being home for the summer, with her parents and the thunderstorms and her dungeon lab. Just that morning she’d enchanted a second-year textbook out of the hands of a hungry, sleep-deprived student – child’s play, really – and she knew she’d be able to spend a month working through it. Next year’s top spot was hers.

Talia was probably going to work in the mill all summer. She was still working on the bread spell – for now, it only succeeded with individual loaves, not on the industrial level she’d need to do any large-scale good – and she was taking two reference books with her to read. She’d also talked of wading in the millpond, and picking wildflowers for the kitchen table, and watching her now, Maleficent could imagine it; a flower tucked in her long hair, her feet bare, her eyes laughing. Too much niceness. 

“You should take the raven with you,” she said.

Talia looked up. “What?”

“If you take him with you,” Maleficent said, feeling slightly irritated at having to explain, “you can write me a letter and tell me how your summer is, and he’ll bring it to me.”

Talia still looked surprised, but after a moment her face softened. “I’ll do that. But only if you promise to write back to me.”

“Nothing ever happens at home,” Maleficent said. She had to raise her voice slightly, because in the next room there was quite the banging going on. Either Merryweather had messed up a spell, Flora was packing for home, they were having an argument, or… well. “Papa paints, and Mother tends the forest. It’s important work, keeping the evil level up to balance out the good, but it’s boring.”

“The last thing I’d call you is boring,” Talia told her, smiling, and Maleficent felt her face becoming uncommonly warm. It would be good to get back to the cool dark of the forests, and out of this pestilent sunshine.

***

As soon as the raven flew into the lab, Maleficent knew something was wrong.

She had been reading, tucked into her favorite chair by the fire, wishing that she had Talia there to bring her tea and toast, when the raven burst in. He looked exhausted, as if he’d flown nearly beyond his strength, and she’d leapt to her feet before she’d even fully registered his arrival.

The letter was short, but clear. Maleficent set down her book, and without bothering to put on her headdress, ran upstairs to find her mother.

“What’s all the rush?” her father asked, looking up from his painting. “Did you blow up the dungeon?”

“I need to borrow mother’s broomstick,” Maleficent said, concentrating on not breathing hard. Those stairs were steeper than she remembered, or maybe it was just that she’d taken them three at a time. “Where is she?”

Her father frowned. “She was going to the far north wood this morning, and she went by broomstick. Why do you need it?”

“There’s an emergency,” Maleficent said, and then, at the expectant look on his face, poured it all out.

According to her letter, Talia had arrived safely home, and for a week had been quite happy catching up with her father and easing into her summer. Then one day her father had been invited to a palace banquet. (Talia had wondered if Stefan had been involved, but he hadn’t come by the mill yet.) When her father had returned, he’d confessed to her that when drunk he’d bragged about his daughter. She could turn wheat stalks into bread, he'd said, proud of her work. Somehow, however, the king and his son had not only already known, but they’d thought she could spin straw into gold as well. Talia's father had tried to explain that the gold was Talia’s roommate, but they hadn’t seemed to understand.

“They don’t know magic,” Maleficent said, finding she was clenching her teeth in anger. “One girl turns one thing into another, that must be the same as another girl doing it with something else. If I can spin straw into gold, Talia must be able to as well.”

“She can’t,” her father surmised.

Maleficent shook her head vehemently. “No, she can’t. But they’re going to make her, as her bride-price for Stefan.”

“Wait,” her father said, setting down his paintbrush. “You’ve lost me. She’s getting married to Stefan?”

“Stefan’s the prince,” Maleficent said. She’d thought she’d explained this before. “You can’t say no to a prince, not when you’re a poor miller’s daughter. And especially not in that kingdom – short of running away and never coming back, Talia can’t disobey a match her father made for her. And her father can’t say no to the king, or they might destroy his business and make him a pauper.”

“That’s just wrong,” her father said bluntly.

Maleficent might have put it more strongly, although when you had magic, swearing was not advisable. It tended to lead to unpredictable explosions. “I need to go to her.”

Rescuing was really more of a good thing. It made her think of princes on valiant steeds galloping up to enchanted castles to save beautiful maidens from the clutches of vicious dragons. By rights, she should be on the other side of this scenario. But everything was all topsy-turvy when it came to Talia.

Besides, there was nothing that said that Maleficent had to agree with _other_ evil people holding her friends captive. Stealing a compatriot's captured maiden could be seen as evil, couldn't it? Ornery and troublesome, at any rate.

“I doubt she's in danger," her father said. "She's a good fairy, isn't she? They wouldn't punish her."

“First of all, she’s a sorceress, not a fairy,” Maleficent started, but gave it up. The definitions were confusing even to magical folk, let alone nonmagical ones. "I just... I don’t know what they’d do to her when they find out she can’t spin them gold.”

She wondered how long Stefan had been confused. Perhaps from the beginning… she wouldn’t be surprised if Merryweather or Flora had been talking in public about the flatmate who was trying to spin straw into gold, and Stefan had overheard and assumed they meant Talia. Gold could be used for good purposes as well as evil, so it could have been Talia's project just as easily as Maleficent's. And Talia had already been transforming wheat stalks into bread - what was so different about gold? (Everything: it was an entirely different subject, just because they both involved transfiguration didn’t mean diddly squat.)

She remembered the roses, the gaudy over-excess of them, the failure to think of anything but the sender’s own agenda. “I have to go.”

“Your mother will be back… sometime,” her father said. Time didn’t matter much to her mother. Sometimes she wound it backwards and played it out again, if she was working on something.

Maleficent abruptly realized that she might know why people cried after all. Frustration, anger, powerlessness – she didn’t like feeling out of control. Not at all.

Her father peered at her for a moment as she struggled with her traitorous feelings. Then he said, slowly, “Does it matter that much?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Maleficent said, vehemently.

Her father stretched, the bones in his neck popping. “All right,” he said. “Go put on something warm. And bring something you can use as a harness – I haven’t flown in twenty years.”

***

It was cold. Very cold.

“You should be able to do this yourself someday, I’d imagine,” her father said, his dragon’s voice a deep rumble, cutting through the wind. “When you're not busy with classes. Your mother said the enchantment should be passed down to you, but you’d have to learn how to use it. It’s a bit painful, changing, mind you.”

They’d found her mother in no time, once Maleficent could look for her from dragonback. She’d thought she’d just borrow her mother’s broomstick, but when she’d tumbled from her father’s back and explained she had to go, _now_ \- she hadn’t wanted to explain it all over again, it had been so long since Talia sent that letter, the entire time of the raven’s flight – her mother had shaken her head. “The broomstick can’t go as fast as your father can, dear,” she’d said, patted Maleficent’s cheek, and released the bindings keeping Maleficent's father from leaving the kingdom.

It was probably only hours until they reached the castle, although it seemed like years. Flying over the others, Maleficent had found moments of amusement imagining the fright and panic below them as a dragon appeared in the afternoon sky. Now, however, as they approached the one where Talia was held, she could find only a cold rock of determination in her stomach.

"Good luck," her father called over his shoulder, as he swooped low to drop her on the battlement.

Evil sorceresses on maiden-stealing missions didn't trouble themselves with thanks. Maleficent tightened her fingers on her wand and set off into the castle.

***

She would have to write a testimonial for Intro Charms, Maleficent thought, as she stood in front of the locked tower door where they were keeping Talia. (Ravens made excellent scouts.) Intro Charms had been dismissed as an “easy class” by some in her year, but the Invisibility Charm had worked well – a few extra blinks from guards she passed, as if their brains and their eyes were disagreeing. One more tumbler in this lock – yes, there it was.

She slipped inside and shut the door again before anyone could notice anything amiss, her heart in her mouth. If they’d mistreated Talia…But no, there she was, curled up under the window, in the one beam of sunlight. Talia had always liked the sunshine.

“Maleficent?” Talia asked, in pure disbelief. “How did you get here so quickly?”

“It’s a long story,” Maleficent said. “Apparently I’m part dragon." The quip fell flat. "Are you all right?”

Talia nodded. Her face was pale. “They haven’t hurt me.” She gestured to the straw all around her, packing every corner of the room. “I have to spin the straw into gold by morning.”

“Or what?” Maleficent prompted.

Talia looked down. “They say my father owes taxes. They’ll take his mill. And… and Stefan thinks I’m lying. He thinks I’m refusing to spin the gold because I don’t want to marry him. I don’t know what he might do in the morning if he thinks I’ve defied him again.”

Maleficent remembered a room full of roses. Just an over-enthusiastic beau, she'd thought at the time, but now it seemed darker. Stefan didn’t do things by halves.

“The funny thing is,” Talia said, with a laugh that didn’t sound like a laugh, “I’d marry him, if he asked me properly.”

“You can’t be serious,” Maleficent said. “After he’s done this to you?”

Talia bit her lip. “I like him well enough,” she said. “I told you I wanted him to come back next year. But what’s more important, I could do so much for my kingdom, if I was their princess. I could work all the time on the bread project, and feed the whole country. They’re hungry right now, Maleficent. I could stop that.”

“He doesn’t want _you_ ,” Maleficent said, feeling fury rise inside her. He didn’t want _Talia_ , not the funny girl who smiled all the time, and was kind to lost evil sorceresses (not that they needed her kindness, but still), and made tea and petted ravens and sat in the windowseat with her face turned up to the sunshine. “He just wants you because he thinks you can spin him gold.”

Talia shook her head. “Not only because of that. Partly. I can’t blame him for wanting gold. We’re a poor kingdom. He likes me, and he thinks I could give him the gold he needs to keep the kingdom safe. That makes sense. Neither evil nor good… human.”

“I think it’s pretty evil,” Maleficent said, and sat down on the straw, uncaring of her clean robe. She abruptly realized that she’d never put on her headdress – her detested red hair was on full display, and Talia hadn't even blinked.

“Yes, well,” Talia said. “You’re supposedly evil, and I don’t think you’re very good at it.”

“I beg your pardon,” Maleficent said, outraged, but she saw the smile in Talia’s eyes and sighed.

Talia sank down beside her, and they sat in silence for a minute. Maleficent could hear a mouse somewhere.

“What happens if you marry him?” she asked at last. “You said he dislikes magic, although obviously he’s not above using it for gold. But he wouldn’t let you come back to Zauberei. And what happens if you have a baby?”

Talia was looking down at her fingers, long and slender. “I wouldn’t go back to Zauberei,” she agreed softly. “I’d miss you terribly, but I’d have to stay here. I’d work on the bread project, and we could send letters.”

“And a baby?” Maleficent prompted.

To be magical, you had to be born to a magical mother. Boys never were magical, although they could pass their mother's magic to their daughters. And many girls weren’t either – the usual ratio was only one in three. But every time a magical mother gave birth to a daughter, she knew her child might be part of the next generation of magic. The magic that kept their world humming, evil and good balanced in harmony. If either predominated, the world would be thrown off kilter, the circle of life malfunctioning, unable to maintain itself. Giving birth was, Maleficent sometimes thought, the most magical thing of all.

(Not that she wanted to do it herself. Babies were not her thing. At all.)

“If it’s a boy, we’ll raise him here,” Talia said.

“Stefan will never let you raise a girl to use her magic,” Maleficent said bluntly.

They had both heard the horror stories of what happened when a girl was denied her magic. Infancy and childhood were both fine, although the girl would constantly feel as if she had a phantom limb somewhere. But adolescence… one girl Maleficent had heard of had accidentally turned her mother into a bear, and another had brought down an entire mountain in a torrential avalanche. You had to be trained in how to _control_ your magic, or you risked disaster when the teenage hormones struck.

“Maybe I’ll be able to convince him,” Talia said, although she didn’t sound sure.

Maleficent shook her head slowly. “I can’t believe you’re considering marrying a man who would deprive your own child of her magical heritage."

“I’m a good sorceress,” Talia said, with a half-shrug. She reached down and tangled their fingers together on the straw. “I have to do good where I see it. My country needs me – I can do good.”

“You could do good for your country _without_ being married to Stefan,” Maleficent retorted, but she knew she’d lost. When good fairies and sorceresses thought they were doing good, they were impossible to budge. It was a bit holier-than-thou, but somehow coming from Talia, Maleficent didn’t mind it as much.

Talia laughed, leaning back against the stone wall. “It’s a moot point, since I can’t spin straw into gold, and you couldn’t possibly do this much in a night even if you wanted to help.” She turned her head. “Thank you for coming, though. I feel safer with you here.”

Maleficent breathed in and out, feeling the air in her lungs, and then said, tightening her fingers on Talia’s, “I’ll do it.”

***

The spinning wheel was old, but Maleficent liked them old. She ran her finger over the grain of the wood, and then sat down in the chair to begin.

“We’ll need a catalyst,” she said, looking up at Talia. “I was using gold thread in the lab. Just a very little, but it suggests to the straw what form it should take.”

Talia looked down at her dress. “No gold thread, I’m sorry.”

Maleficent's raven could fit through the bars, but where would he find gold thread to steal in the middle of the night, in a strange place?

Talia laughed, and the sound made Maleficent look up sharply. “What?”

“I do have gold thread,” Talia said, her smile oddly bittersweet. She drew her wand and cut the long fall of her hair, laying the shorn tresses by Maleficent’s hand.

Maleficent swallowed. It would grow back, she knew, but still she felt the immensity of the sacrifice, even though Talia was smiling. “I’ll start, then.”

“What can I do to help?” Talia asked, sinking onto the straw-covered floor next to the spinning wheel.

“Tell me about your kingdom,” Maleficent said, beginning to spin. “Tell me why you would leave Zauberei and give up that future for a man who hates your magic unless it’s giving him gold. Tell me why.”

Talia was silent for a minute, and the only sound was that of the wheel.

Then she leaned her head against Maleficent’s leg and began.

“When I was a little girl, I loved to play in the meadow, finding flowers for my mother and pebbles to skip in the stream…”

***

When Maleficent had begun to spin, she hadn’t truly thought she could do it. An entire room in one night? Perhaps Stefan would be satisfied with _some_ gold. She’d only managed a handful at school, and that had been counted good.

But there in that tower room, with Talia’s voice winding on – almost magical, or _was_ it magical? – with stories from her childhood, and Talia’s head resting against her leg, and strands of Talia’s golden hair mixing with the straw she was spinning into gold thread, everything suddenly seemed possible.

Talia collected the full bobbins, talking all the while. Her voice was a little ragged now, but she didn’t stop. Maybe this was the old kind of magic, Maleficent thought, watching her own fingers work as if hypnotized. Evil magic and good magic, coming together to form a more perfect whole. She spun as if her life depended on it – as if Talia’s life depended on it – and poured all the speed she could into her wheel.

When morning came, the straw was gold thread, wound neatly on the bobbins.

“Your fingers,” Talia breathed, holding Maleficent’s hands in her own. Maleficent had kept Talia from seeing them, during, but they would hurt for some time, rubbed raw. “Oh, Maleficent.” She brought them to her lips.

“It’s done,” Maleficent said, gruffly – then, losing her dignity, because it had been a long night, and before that she'd had all those hours on dragonback – “Will you be happy?”

Talia looked up. “I’ll be good,” she said, with a half-smile. “Will _you_ be happy?”

“I’ll be evil,” Maleficent said, because that was what you had to say, but…

“Try to be happy too,” Talia said, and smiled at her, in that one sunlit moment before Stefan came to claim his bride.

***

Maleficent graduated top of her class from Zauberei University, beating her sea-witch competitor by half a point. She took advanced transfiguration in her last two years, and by the time she came home as a fully-trained sorceress, she could draw on her dragon blood at will. Her father (who had indeed returned to the castle, after a pleasure-jaunt down the coast scaring fishermen) took her on long flights over the forest. When she was on the ground, she worked in her lab – and sometimes, when she couldn’t escape it, helped with the weeding.

From afar, she read the news about Talia’s kingdom. The gold she’d spun had paid for roads, farming equipment, medicine – and a standing army. Good mixed with evil; typical for nonmagical humans. Talia had become beloved nearly instantly, walking throughout her kingdom giving out medicine and bread (and tea, Maleficent didn’t doubt). By the time Stefan's father died three years into their marriage, Talia was a national treasure, and the newspapers were already calling her the most beautiful queen the kingdom had ever had. (Maleficent wasn't sure why beauty was so important. Good people always acted as if beautiful meant good, and ugly meant bad, but as far as she could tell, aesthetics and magical allegiances were completely different things.)

Talia’s letters told the same story. Stefan was kind enough, and she was happily consumed with her work. She told stories she’d heard around campfires as she traveled around the kingdom, and sent dried flowers that tumbled from the pages into Maleficent’s hands. Maleficent sent back news from the magical world, and beautiful stones she’d found while fishing in the forest streams, and once one of her father’s paintings. It was of a red-haired girl standing by a window, looking out over a forest.

After five years, Maleficent’s mother decided to move north. Her architectural training was an itch under her skin, and she longed to build another castle, in a great uncharted territory. Perhaps out of ice this time, she said. Forget gardening, she had pulled enough weeds for a lifetime.

For fifteen years, Talia and Stefan did not have a child.

And then one day the raven flew in Maleficent's window, a christening invitation around its neck.

***

Maleficent remembered that dawn. She'd convinced Stefan that Talia had nearly killed herself spinning the gold he needed, and that the effort had burned out the gift. If he cared for his bride, he would have to make do with the roomful of gold he already had, and not kill her by demanding more and more.

(She may have also implied that if any harm came to Talia, she would divide him into a million pieces, possibly while he was still alive. Sometimes being evil came in handy. The ferociously crazy red hair and her own exhaustion had no doubt added to the effect, as had the raven on her shoulder.)

Stefan had sworn he wouldn’t ask again. Maleficent had wanted to believe the worst of him, after what he'd put Talia through, but she'd seen the regret and concern in his eyes when he looked at Talia, along with the understandable wariness of the evil witch pointing a wand at him. Against her better judgement, she'd believed him.

Now Talia had given birth, at long last, and her baby was a magical child.

Maleficent didn’t know what she would do. She only knew that Talia had called for her help, once again, and that she would do whatever she had to do to save Talia’s baby, because it was Talia’s. She drank a mug of tea, and shut up the castle.

She’d think of what to do on the way.

***

The fifteen years hadn’t been kind to the three good fairies who had roomed with them. In retrospect, Maleficent supposed they had been harmless. Fauna had been sweet; she still didn’t know how Flora and Merryweather had found time to study for their exams in between all their bickering. But she was playing a part here – the Evil Sorceress Coming To Do Evil – and so she laughed at them and called them rabble.

Behind them, Talia was pale as death, but she looked steadily at Maleficent, and Maleficent could see the trust in her eyes.

 _Only for you, Talia_ , she thought. _Only for you would I take a squalling child and raise her. Hopefully her magic begins to show later rather than sooner, for both our sakes. You, to have her in her babyhood, and me, to **not** have her in her babyhood._

“I really felt quite distressed at not receiving an invitation,” she said aloud, for Stefan’s benefit. He would never have asked her, even though she was the strongest evil sorceress near his kingdom and should by rights have been invited.

“You weren’t wanted,” Merryweather said, as ornery as ever.

Maleficent almost smiled, but turned it into a shocked gasp instead. “Not want-? Oh dear, what an awkward situation. I had hoped it was merely due to some oversight.Well, in that event, I’d best be on my way.”

She turned to go. This was Talia’s last chance – if she wanted to keep the babe and risk it, hope against hope that the girl would grow up to have only the littlest, controllable magic, she had only to stay silent and let Maleficent go.

“And – you’re not offended, Your Excellency?” Talia said, her voice shaking.

“Why, no, Your Majesty,” Maleficent said, and turned again. She met Talia’s eyes. “And to show I bear no ill will, I too shall bestow a gift on the child.”

A curse that is no curse, she thought, drawing on her inner strength even as she raised her staff. A voiced curse with no magic behind it, given for an altruistic purpose – the lines were so fuzzy now, they were hardly lines. Good, evil; today they came together in one purpose, even as they had fifteen years ago.

The kingdom had looked prosperous as she had flown over it. The nobility and gentry crowded into the throne room looked well-fed, even if their finery was a bit threadbare. Talia had done well, had done _good_.

Now to balance the score, for everyone to see.

 _Grow strong, little one_ , she thought, even as she ‘cursed’ the babe to die before her sixteenth birthday. Death could be feigned in many ways; Talia would only have to send her word when the child’s magic manifested, and she could spirit her away, to raise her safely. _Grow strong, and let your magic stay unwoken as long as may be._

On the dais, Talia looked at her steadily, her eyes saying more than she ever could.

***

_twenty years later_

“You’re alive,” Philip said. “You died!”

Aurora leaned against the tree. “Well, not _exactly_. I only mostly died.”

“You can’t _mostly_ die,” Philip said, and his horse snorted. Maleficent let a little dragon into her smell, and watched his nostrils flare in alarm. “And what are you doing with _her_? She cursed you!”

“She saved me,” Aurora corrected. “I was about a month away from exploding the whole castle. Now I could still explode it, but it would be on purpose.” She grinned suddenly, full of mischievous sweetness. “I could bring down that abandoned tower over there, if you like?”

“No, thank you,” Philip said, politely, as Maleficent said, “No waste. And there are birds nesting in that tower.”

“I wasn’t really going to bring it down,” Aurora told Maleficent. “But I could,” she added, to Philip.

He stroked his horse’s mane, nervously. “Are you coming home now?”

“For a little while,” Aurora said. “But then I’m enrolling in Zauberei this fall.”

“The magical university?” Philip asked, dubiously. “Your father won’t like that.”

Aurora tossed her hair, that long golden fall of her mother’s. “Well, he’ll just have to get used to it. It’s not every day that your daughter returns from the dead – I think I’ve got six years’ worth of favors stored up. Besides, I’ve got a dragon to help me if I need one,” she said sunnily.

Philip looked around nervously.

Laughing, Aurora gathered up her skirts. “Come on, you can walk me home. You can catch me up on all the news on the way. You’ve grown about a foot, for instance.”

The raven perched on Aurora's shoulder, and they walked off together toward the castle.

Smiling, Maleficent turned her face up toward the afternoon sky, letting the sunlight warm her skin.

**Author's Note:**

> **SPOILERS:**
> 
>  
> 
>  **Crossovers** (thanks for the encouragement to write these in, Untherius! it was a lot of fun)  
>  _Main:_  
>  Rumpelstiltskin (fairy tale)  
>  _Secondary:_  
>  The Little Mermaid (1989)  
> Mulan (1998)  
> Brave (2012)  
>  _"Ish"/inspiration:_  
>  Frozen (2013)  
> Wicked (musical)
> 
>  **Canon Divergence**  
>  Maleficent's curse is not able to be amended by Merryweather. But it's not actually a curse - it's a fake curse, an act so that when Aurora's magic begins to manifest, her mother can send her away to Maleficent to be magically trained. (Her father would not be willing to allow this, but an untrained sorceress can be lethally dangerous.) Maleficent raises Aurora from the age of fourteen, and in the epilogue, she has been fully trained and is on her way to reunite with her parents.
> 
>  **Other Notes**  
>  * "Zauberei" is German for sorcery/magic/witchcraft. As the Brothers Grimm version of _Sleeping Beauty_ is ostensibly a German fairytale (although there are many others), I've borrowed it for the name for the magical university where Maleficent and Talia meet.  
>  * "Talia" is one of the original names for Aurora's character in the fairytale. Since she already has a name in the Disney version, I borrowed it for her mother instead.


End file.
